The Full Moon in Taurus
This lunation felt deeply personal for me, as Taurus is my sign of the year. My switchover from Aries arrived just a few days before this lunation, in the first few degrees of the slow, embodied sign of Taurus. So you could say this experience got right down to business regarding the themes of the year ahead for me. With a recent death in the family, a milestone birthday, and this Full Moon conjunct my natal Ketu, I’ve been surrounded by endings of all kinds.
The Full Moon in Taurus happened on Sunday, October 25th at 9:11 PM PT at 2°45’ of the fixed earth sign. Its ruler, retrograde Venus, had just slipped back into the late degrees of Libra, fresh off her conjunction with the Sun. Astrologers call this a Cazimi, a rebirth, and for Venus, this occurs at the halfway point of her retrograde cycle. It's a brief moment when she’s given a break to catch her breath during a period of combustion, or extreme stress, for the planet. Just like finding a beautiful oasis in the middle of a desert. Here, Our Lady of Life’s Sweetness had a moment of reprieve.
This detail matters, as it clarifies our values. Remember, Venus is the embodied benefic, and she rules over all things that make life worth living. Here, the intense solar fire burned away all the dross and detritus our planet of love, connection, and sweetness had accumulated since January, especially since the end of August.
The Cazimi also marks Venus’ transition from evening star to morning star.
Venus, in her morning guise, dons her battle gear as a warrior goddess. This trait stems from her Mesopotamian origins as Ishtar, Sumerian Inanna, and Phoenician Astarte. So what happens when the Moon, our luminary of the emotional interior and essential material life, ruled by a recently re-birthed Goddess (think Persephone as Praxidike, the underworld queen ready to deliver justice), enters the early degrees of one of the most practical and resource-oriented signs of the zodiac? She illuminates a path forward and helps you bridge, plainly and realistically, from where you are to where you want to be.
This Moon shows what’s not working with your values and/or resources, and how you’ve been contributing to it in the part of your chart containing Taurus. Not in a blamey-shamey way, but realistically.
The tarot card syncretized with this lunation is the Five of Pentacles. This version from the Jupiter’s Eye Tarot perfectly illustrates the path between where you are and where you’re headed.
If the smoke from your burning desire has obstructed your vision, it's hard to know where you’re going. The Moon and Sun are also in a tight aspect with Pluto, our Lord of the Underworld and transformational King. Pluto in Aquarius has been creating tension in the early degrees of both Taurus and Scorpio since 2024, which, IMO, means we’re ready to see what’s actually here.
Before something transforms and becomes something new, it needs to die. Deaths of all sorts have their own timetable. When someone we love dies, or a relationship ends, the change in the material world is pretty instant, but in the subtle realm of our emotional, intellectual, and spiritual domain, it happens much more slowly on average. It’s inconvenient. This process demands time and attention that we don’t have, and we are required to make room for it.
That’s what I did. When I got news that my Aunt had passed, after the initial emotions of sadness upon hearing the news, my next thought was how inconvenient this whole business of death and dying is; I had plans for my October, dammit.
Next, a flurry of activity. Reaching out to clients and students to reschedule. I squared away travel arrangements and asked neighbors for help with pet care and airport runs.
Then something shifted. After the frenzy of attempting to book last-minute air travel to make it to the funeral in time, a clarity emerged.
This situation is one of the very reasons I was motivated to work for myself in the first place. Freedom to choose how I spend my time and the ability to create space in my life for what I value. In this case, that meant being there to support people I love and attend to my own emotions of loss.
When my grandfather passed in late 2021, I asked for more time off and was told it wasn’t a good time for the company. Turns out death and grief are wildly inconvenient for more than just family members. I eventually resigned, and here, almost five years later, I was able to do what I wanted all along.
And that is what this Full Moon in Taurus offered us. A heightened sense of how close we are to living in alignment with our values, and a realistic plan to get from A to B if we aren’t. A metaphorical death for the old way, and all the excuses about why we couldn’t make a change.
Are you tired of performing the life you thought you wanted?
If you are carrying the static of everyone else’s expectations, it is easy to lose sight of your own rhythm. You may be highly efficient and capable, yet feel strangely out of sync—as if your outer life no longer reflects the depth ripening within.
The gap between where you are and where you want to be signals that it is time to prune what no longer serves you.
I help women identify these hidden gaps. In a 75-minute consultation, we look at your chart to identify exactly what is ripe for harvest and what must be turned back into the soil. You leave with the clarity to tend to the truth of your own life, not the expectations that don't belong to you.